


don't you ever hang your head

by flysafepapi



Category: Peaky Blinders (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-06
Updated: 2020-10-06
Packaged: 2021-03-07 21:54:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,472
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26854789
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flysafepapi/pseuds/flysafepapi
Summary: He meets the love of his life when he’s eight years old, although he doesn’t realise that at the time.*They're both 17, hence the underage tag*
Relationships: Finn Shelby/Original Female Character(s)
Kudos: 13





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Come rant to me on my tumblr.  
> Same username, dudes.

He meets the love of his life when he’s eight years old, although he doesn’t realise that at the time. All he sees then, as he walks through the school office back from the headmaster’s office, is the new girl sitting on the chairs outside the school nurse’s room, holding a wet cloth to her bruised and busted knuckles, and just stares when she looks up and sees him. For a minute, they just stare at each other, and then she pats the seat next to her and says “You can sit down, I won’t bite.” He’s actually not sure about that, considering what he’d seen her do to one of the other girls, but he sits anyway and asks her where she moved here from. When he thinks back on it years later, he’ll realise that was the moment that she decided she was going to stick with him for the rest of time. 

“Andy, what are you doing?”

“Shh, you’ll wake up the whole house with that noise,” she says, sliding into the bed behind him like she’s done thousands of times, but those times had been when they’d both still been kids. Not now, when they’re both a few months off 18 and too big to fit in the single bed comfortably. Somehow they make it work, mostly because she squashes herself against his back and throws an arm over his waist, shuffling forward until there’s no space left between them. “Had a bad dream, you know I don’t like storms.”

Just as she finishes speaking, thunder rumbles outside the windows and he feels her flinch at the loud noise. It still confuses him, how someone could be so afraid of thunder but fearless when it comes to lightning, but that’s his Andrea. 

“If we get caught, it’ll be both of us getting a lecture about inappropriate behaviour,” Finn says, but doesn’t do anything to make her leave. Instead, he rolls over so they’re facing each other, practically nose to nose with the proximity. There’s no room to move away, and he’s not sure he would even if he had the space. “We’re not kids anymore, Andy.”

“I know. I wouldn’t do this if we were still kids.”

He’s been kissed before, despite what his brothers think, but none of them compare even halfway to the way she kisses him now, pressed close to him in the dark. When his hands move, he’s not exactly sure, but soon enough she’s rolled over so she’s laying on top of him, burying her hands into his hair, and his hands are on her hips, holding her as tight as he dares. Which, honestly, is tighter than he’d think of if she had been any other girl, but he knows firsthand exactly how much Andrea can take. He’s seen her get into fist fights with boys more than twice her size without hesitation, so the clench of his fingers around her middle is nothing. 

“Where’d this come from?”

“It’s always been there, Finn, you’re just blind and don’t know how to make the first move.”

He opens his mouth to say something, but gets cut off by his bedroom door opening and the light flicking on. After his eyes adjust to the sudden brightness, he looks up to see Tommy looking down at them with his arms crossed over his chest, trying to look stern but being betrayed by the amusement in his eyes. 

“Andrea, your father’s downstairs, wants to know if we’ve seen you.”

“I’m not here, Tommy, please?”

Now, in the light, Finn can see the bruises along her neck and arms, too large to be his own, and if it wasn’t for her weight on him, keeping him down, he’s pretty sure he’d already be down the stairs. He knows Tommy sees them too, because he frowns for a minute, before he nods. 

“I hope you know what you’re doing, Andrea.”

It’s clear from his tone that he means with Finn, not just hiding from her father, and she nods. 

“Never been more sure of anything, boss.”

“Good.” He steps out and starts to close the door, but stops and pokes his head back around the partially open door, smirking at his younger brother now. “Don’t do anything without protection, eh, Finn? Don’t need any more Shelbys running around the place just yet.”

Finn throws the first thing he gets his hands on, which is apparently one of Andrea’s shoes, at the closing door, and Andrea grins when she hears Tommy’s laughter on the other side of the door. 

“Well, you heard the man,” she says, turning to Finn with a grin and holding up the small packet she digs out of her pants pocket. “I came prepared.”


	2. Chapter 2

Andrea is still staring at him, but Finn can see the cogs moving behind her eyes, considering and calculating. It’s a look that he’s seen countless times before, but never directed at him, not like this. Her cool fingers brush against the inside of his wrist where she’s still holding him, and Finn’s breath comes out in a rush, so fast that there’s a chance he might pass out before they do anything. “Do you really need the invitation?”

“Humour me.”

There’s a rough pull on his wrist, dragging him closer even though he’s pretty sure that there’s no space left for him to move into, pressed close together so that Andrea’s lips barely brush along his when she looks him square in the eyes and says “Take me to bed, Finn Shelby.”

He doesn’t really register that he’s moving, only in the vaguest, peripheral way, when he curls his hands into the soft worn fabric of Andrea’s borrowed shirt and pushes her backwards onto the bed. She lands with a bounce, and the sound of ancient bed springs screeching under her sudden weight, and moans when he follows her down, covering her with his body. Her hands are everyone at once, scratching down his back, pulling at his shoulders, tugging at his hair. It’s an easy thing, to fit between her legs, pull her down until she’s got them wrapped around his hips tight like she plans on never moving again.

It’s new, in a way that should freak him out, because they’ve done things before, but nothing like this, but he only looks down at her like she’s a goddess come to life and can’t process anything except the little noises she makes when he rocks forward against her, cutting off when he kisses her. Andrea’s hands, still taking in as much of him as they can, grab him hard by the back of the neck, fingernails digging in none too lightly, and it hurts and makes him whine a little at the same time. After a few seconds, her hands trail forward towards his collar and attempt to work the buttons free with slack, numb fingers. Eventually, she gets too impatient and pulls, popping the buttons off to scatter across the sheets, forgotten as soon as they’re out of sight. Her frenzied movements spur him to do the same, although far better than she’d managed, if only by a thread.

“Finn,” She pants against his lips. He finally frees the last button and shifts back enough so she can lift up a little, pulls the shirt out from underneath her and throws it over his shoulder. She’s wearing nothing underneath, and for a second he’s caught by how she looks in the low light from the lamp, cast in warm yellow that plays across her skin. He starts to work on his own shirt, but she beats him to it, batting his hands away with a grin.

“Say it,” He mumbles in between kisses, moving his attention to her pants, pulling the belt out of the loops and not even bothering with the buttons, just dragging the fabric down her legs. “Say it again. I want to hear you fucking say it.” Finally, she gets his buttons undone, although several of them are just barely hanging by threads, and pushes it off his shoulders to reveal pale skin.

“Fuck,” Andrea moans when Finn scrapes blunt nails across stomach. His thumbs press hard into her skin, a steady pressure that drags down to the waist of her underwear and she can’t help the way she shakes when that pressure reaches her hips.

“Fucking Christ.” Her head is thrown back against the pillows, hair spread around her and her neck one long pale line that Finn can’t help but lean in and taste. She jerks again, senses overloaded as he mouths at his neck and presses the heel of his hand into the apex of her legs. She thrusts against his hand, little aborted movements that make him shiver like he can feel the movements through her. He tries to brace himself, one knee on the small bed and one foot against the floor, so both his hands are free, but it’s hard to find the right balance and he huffs in frustration when he slips.

“Please, Finn. Please.”

Finn’s mouth goes dry as he tugs at the ties at the sides of her underwear. He actually doesn’t mean to take everything off in one go. It just sort of happens. One minute she’s still covered from the waist down, the next minute she’s splayed naked across the bed.

“Oh..” Finn breathes. Andrea stares back at him, completely bare, not moving while she watches him with sharp eyes, committing everything to memory. His hands move with a mind of their own, undoing his own pants. She tracks the movement with her eyes, watching him push the pants and underwear off his hips, then shift to pull off socks and free his legs. And then he just stands there, watching her, while he runs a hand over his own stomach, over and down until it drifts to his aching cock.

“Finn,” she begs, something that he’s pretty sure is something she wasn’t capable of, before now at least, “Please. Fucking touch me.”

And God, how can he resist such a request? He’s on the bed, spread out over Andrea’s body in a heartbeat, hands sliding up over thighs and ribs, lingering over shoulders and neck, thumbs pressing into the base of the throat before one tangles itself in the her soft hair and the other shoots down to press against her again, fingers sliding through her.

She yelps and twitches like she’s been shocked, straining against his heavier body, back arching though her head doesn’t move, anchored in place by the grip on her hair. His pace is brutal. He presses one finger into her, without any preamble, and rocks against her as he bites down on the curve of her shoulder. Not enough to be painful, but just enough to sting, to make a mark against her pale skin.

Andrea shakes beneath him, hands everywhere at once, unsure of where to settle. They grip his shoulders, slide over the muscles of his back. They gently cup the back of his neck and head, then they slide down past his waist and dig into the backs of his thighs, when he slides another finger in alongside the first.

It takes him a moment to realise Andy is actually trying to say words. It’s hard to hear over the sound of sliding flesh and the heavy pants that permeate the room, so Finn pulls his mouth from a reddened collarbone to make his way towards her mouth, pressing kisses to the column of her throat as he goes.

When he finally hears her, it’s almost over right then and there.

It’s two words, repeated over and over again in delirium. Three, if you counted the occasional prayer of his name, and it fills every corner of the bedroom.

“Fuck me, fuck me, fuck me… Finn, please-”

She damn near cries when Finn swats her hands away from herself, where she was pressing her thumb to her clit in slow circles, and then actually howls when Finn sucks the sensitive bundle of nerves between his lips. She sounds like she’s fucking dying, struggling against the hands that hold her down hips as Finn flicks his tongue against her. The hands that finally find their way to the back of his head scratch through his short hair, making him shiver and moan. He has no finesse. He’s had no practice.

He works at her, determined, sliding two fingers in and out of Andrea’s body while he licks along her. He can see Andrea’s face now. She’s staring at Finn like she’s never seen him before, like he’s a fucking deity sent down to earth to touch her until she burns away to ashes. The intensity of it makes Finn’s stomach flip, makes him stop what he’s doing, pull his mouth and hands from Andrea’s body and crawl on his hands and knees to her lips.

“You make me fucking crazy,” he whispers into Andrea’s panting mouth. It sounds more like a plea than a statement, even to Finn’s own ears. Andrea must hear it too, because Finn is suddenly being pulled down again. The kiss is different this time. Andrea kisses Finn like she’ll never have the chance again. She kisses like she’s in love.

He struggles to control the tone and pitch of his voice when he says, “Are you sure? We don’t.. we don’t have to-”

“I know you won’t hurt me.”

He pats blindly at the bedspread with his free hand until his fingers touch the small cardboard packet, then the little square is between his teeth, and he’s tearing it open with an enthusiasm that makes her laugh at him, grinning when he smiles back. He arches up and Andrea meets him half way, kissing him deeply while Finn rolls the condom on himself, and pushes him down to swing a leg over him and settle on his thighs, watching the movements of his hands.

“Are you sure?” he whispers, and he knows the question is as much for himself as it is for Andrea. He knows that, if they do this, there will be no going back. She doesn’t answer him with words. Instead, she wraps a hand around the back of Finn’s head and pulls him into another kiss, a softer one this time, trying to say things without making a sound. The hand that wraps around his cock is tentative at first, just a graze, but Finn groans anyway and the hand becomes sure, wrapping around him and guiding him, until-

When she gets the angle right and sinks down onto him, he feels his heart stop. He freezes completely, helpless, powerless to do anything but watch Andrea’s face as she slides down, inch by slow, agonising inch until she’s fully seated, panting and sweating like she’s run a fucking marathon.

“Jesus Christ,” Finn whispers when there’s air in his lungs again. His hands grip Andrea’s hips, his thumbs rubbing over the jut of hipbones, a soothing gesture as much for himself as it is for her. A feeble attempt at grounding himself, lest he simply float away.

“How are you – how does it feel?”

“Full,” is the response, and Andrea’s voice is a little deeper, like it’s been completely blown out and abused. It makes Finn want to grind up into her, make her scream until that voice is gone completely. But he waits. He knows it has to be Andrea who decides what happens next.

He doesn’t have to wait long. “Do it,” she groans, rotating her hips ever so slightly. “Do it, Finn.” Another rotation. “Fuck me.” And this time she rises, slides herself up, almost all the way off before she drops back down and makes Finn see fucking stars.

“You want me to fuck you?” he growls, hands everywhere, and Andrea just nods, frantically.

“Yes, yes, yes,” she pants through the disjointed, almost broken movements. “Fuckmefuckmefuckme..” But then there’s a wince. Finn catches it right away, even though Andrea tries to cover it up. She keeps moving, faltering only for a second, and there it is again; a split-second flash of pain and Finn is pressing his thumbs into Andrea’s hips so hard he knows there will be bruises later, chanting, “Stop. Stop stop stop.”

Andrea stutters to a halt. “Jesus, I’m hurting you.” He’s horrified and tries to lift Andrea off as gently as he can but she pushes him flat against the bed with a hand on his chest. “No, no you’re not,” she says, breathless, “It’s my knee, it’s never been the same since I shattered it, remember? I’m fine, it’s fine.”

The relief that floods through Finn could wipe whole villages off the map like a goddamn tidal wave, destroying every last structure and wall left. He presses his own hand over the one on Andrea’s leg, and gives it a squeeze.

Then he flips them over.

There’s no moment of respite. Finn pushes and twists until Andrea’s legs are wrapped around his waist and then he moves. Andrea can’t do anything except hold on for dear life. Finn keeps one hand over Andrea’s bad leg and the other tangled in her hair. He fucks her like the world will end any minute, like the city is burning around them and nothing else matters but what’s happening inside this room. Andrea’s nails bite into Finn’s back and shoulders, but the pain only makes him drive deeper, until he’s rewarded with a blast of profanity with every thrust.

“Fuck. Finn, Finn, Finn..”

The hand on the thigh remains, while the one in Andrea’s hair moves down between her legs. She whines, and shivers like she’s being electrocuted, but Finn doesn’t stop. He rubs circles around her slowly, like she’d been doing to herself earlier, without finesse, trying to keep his balance, some kind of rhythm.

“Oh God. Oh God! Fuckfuckfuckfuck!”

Andrea’s whole body arches right off the bed. She tightens around him, almost painfully so, and he’s not sure if that’s what does it, or the way Andrea is looking at him. Maybe it’s the police siren crying in the distance, but Finn shoves into Andrea just once, twice, and then drops his head to her shoulder and groans into the skin there as he finishes.

Finn collapses on top of Andrea, taking care not to crush her bad knee. There’s a solid minute of heavy breathing and slowing heart rates before Finn feels that hand in his hair, and everything that happened within the last forty-eight hours hits him all over again.

“I love you.”

The statement hangs in the quiet room, echoing over the sounds of their heartbeats. Finn breathes in and out, letting the meaning sink in while Andrea continues to play with his hair and she hums, pressing a kiss to his forehead.

For the longest time, they’d just been friends, even if they’d been dancing around each other for the last few years, but both of them know that none of that is so simple anymore. It used to be black and white, things they kept away from because crossing the line from friends into anything else was unthinkable, but none of that exists anymore. There’s only the truth, that he’d never do anything to hurt her, and she’d always do everything within her power to protect him.

When he kisses her, after they’ve cleaned up and lay curled up in the bed together, it feels like a promise.


	3. Chapter 3

“I can handle it,” Andrea says, when Finn traces careful fingers along the bruises on her arms. “It’s not a big deal.” It’s a sensitive subject with her, anything to do with her father and the marks he leaves on her. Privately, Finn thinks that’s why she’s prone to getting into fights, to get out her frustrations on someone she can fight back against. “He’s never been the same since he came back from the war. You know what it’s like.” She lays in his arms for another few minutes before she pulls away and says she should get home, and he watches her as she pulls her clothes back on. He thinks about asking if she wants him to walk her home, but he knows that she’d never say yes, so he doesn’t say anything.

The sun has barely risen over the buildings outside, and there’s a chill in the air that makes her cross her arms over her chest and wish that she’d asked for a coat before she left. Maybe some shoes, too, but she doesn’t mind the cold stones underneath her feet as much. It reminds her of when her and her mother would take walks down to the canal and sit on the banks, sandwiches in a basket hanging from her mother’s arm. It’s too painful to dwell on it, so she pushes the thoughts out of her head and turns down her street with a hum. 

“Where have you been? Out all night, are you whoring yourself out, girl?”

She jumps when her father’s voice echoes through the kitchen and almost loses her grip on the tin cup she’d filled with water, not bothering to turn the light on with the rays of sunlight just now making their way through the dirty glass windows. She had been hoping that he was still sleeping, so she could sneak past him and up to her bedroom, but her luck has never been good. Not today, apparently.

“No, I was at a friend’s house. They asked me to stay for dinner and I fell asleep. It won’t happen again.”

She almost makes it past him to the stairs when her father grabs her by the shoulder, hard, and yanks her back, almost making her lose her footing. The smell of rum is on his breath when he pulls her close, a smell that’s all too familiar, and she has to turn her face away from him when he hisses that he knows where she’s been. 

“You’ve been with that Shelby boy, haven’t you?”

“No. I told you, I was at a friend’s house. Ask Lillian’s parents, they’ll tell you.” 

Of course, they’ll say that she had dinner there, not that she spent the night, but she’s hoping that her father won’t ask if she slept over. 

“Don’t fucking lie to me, you think I don’t know that you’ve been with him? My own daughter, a whore for a gangster.” 

By now, his grip on her shoulder has become painful, and it only gets worse when he slaps her, hard with the back of his hand, and she stumbles back into the counter. When she raises a shaking hand to her mouth, she feels the slick wetness of blood on her chin, and knows that she’s bitten clean through. The entire right side of her face stings from the blow, but she refuses to cry. Not now.

“Fuck you.” 

She shouldn’t have said it, but by the time she realises, it’s too late to take it back. Her father turns back around to her, eyes blazing, and in that moment she understands that she’s made a mistake. Too late, she runs, but she doesn’t make it more than a step or two before her father slams into her and pushes her to the table, wrapping a hand around her neck. 

“I will not have a whore for a daughter,” he says, or she supposes, because it’s hard to hear anything over the pounding of blood in her ears, and the sound of the table scraping against the floor as she tries to get away from the fingers curled around her neck. “Why can’t you just be good?” For a second, she thinks he sounds remorseful, but then the fingers tighten and cut off her air even more, and then it doesn’t matter. 

It’s almost funny, when she thinks back on it. Somewhere between getting pinned to the table and the spots clearing from her eyes, her fingers have scrambled across the surface of the table and wrapped around the knife that her father must have left from his dinner the night before, and then she’s driving it into his side. It’s an awkward angle, but she manages, and gasps for air when the hands fall away. 

“I am not a whore.”

“You stabbed me.” Her father looks down at the knife still buried in his side, dumbly, like he’s not entirely sure what’s happened. 

“You tried to kill me.” She doesn’t know if it’s a mercy or just killing him quicker, taking the knife out, but she does it anyway and finds a little satisfaction in the way he groans and cries out at the pain. “I am not a fucking whore.” 

Maybe she gets a little bit carried away, when he tells her that she’s just like her mother, giving it up to anyone that paid her a little bit of attention, and she stabs him again. Then again, and again. “I hate you, I hate you,” she hisses, with every downward plunge of the knife, and by the time the anger fades out of her, the floor is covered in blood and her arm aches. 

“Andrea? The neighbour called me, she said she heard yelling.” 

She almost laughs, when she hears Tommy outside the door, and calls to him that it’s open. She’s not sure she knows how to move properly at the moment, unable to get up off her knees from the bloody kitchen floor. 

“Jesus Christ. What the fuck happened here?” 

Finn’s with him, because of course he is, and looks like he isn’t sure whether he should be pissed or worried so he’s settled on something that looks like a mixture of both. 

“He tried to kill me. I got there first.” She laughs, and can’t stop laughing even when Finn picks her up and takes her into the bathroom to clean her up while Tommy deals with the body of her father. What’s left of it, anyway. “I got there first.” 

“Yeah, love, you got him. You’re safe now.” 

“Finn?”

“Yeah?”

“I killed a man.” 

He smiles at her, carefully, and helps her step into the bathtub, still wearing all her clothes. 

“I know. It’s going to be alright, we’ll take care of it.” 

“I didn’t mean to do it, but once I started I couldn’t stop. I just did it, over and over.” Through the steam, she can only barely make out his silhouette, but she knows he’s there because he’s holding tight to her hand like she’ll disappear if he lets go. “I’m a murderer.” 

“No. You”re just-”

“You’re going to marry a murderer.” 

“Who said we were getting married?”

She waves a hand, but grins. “Don’t you know? It was always going to happen. You’re going to marry me one day, Finn Shelby.”


End file.
